The oldest profession and sexually transmitted disease have gone hand in hand for centuries. Shaming sexually active women is old as time, as well. Do you think that by now we’d address the public health risks in a way that shows the evolution of our understanding and growing knowledge? Of course not. Prostitution and STDs are stigmatized interconnectedly, much like discussion around abortion devolves to slut shaming.

I have been a proponent of the regulation of prostitution for a very long time. I’m also against slut shaming. These two go together. Let’s break it down. In our society, men are thought to require sex constantly, a sexist notion that puts both cis genders at high risk for problems. When the women in these men’s lives refuse to give them sex, or the men are single, they go to someone who can service their needs. That part is often ignored, because boys will be boys. The prostitute is to blame, as is any wife in the equation.

Religions either teach that sex outside of marriage is filthy or that the act at all is filthy—unless in a marriage and for procreation. This dissonance leads to shame. Shame leads to hiding. Prostitution is an all but hidden fact of our world culture. The nature of it, several partners for the exchange of money, no questions and usually no condoms (until recent times, and even that inconsistent).

In committed relationships, most men don’t use condoms either. The condom has been around for centuries with varying degrees of effectiveness. The technology of today’s condom makes them pretty fool-proof protection against STDs and unwanted pregnancy, but they’re not perfect. In combination with education and proper health care, the condom has made STDs increasingly rare, but certainly not gone. In addition, the stigma of having sex or an STD remains. If a husband visits a prostitute and contracts an STD, he will transmit that to his wife because it is unlikely they use a condom. This is how middle class women from upwardly mobile families in committed marriages were getting diagnosed with AIDS. Dishonesty in relationships is part of hiding one’s sexuality.

Instead of keeping prostitution hidden, regulating the industry would not only minimize if not remove a number of public health risks that the women and men who do sex work suffer (domestic violence, rape, infection), but those benefits would be extended to the general public. Men and women who make use of such services would have far less fear of being harmed during a transaction (either being robbed, assaulted or infected). Sex workers, in addition, would only be those who chose the vocation. Too many young people are kidnapped or forced into prostitution as a means of survival. Regulation would prevent that and give sex workers greater autonomy.

A side benefit of such a change would be the lessening of the stigma around sex. This is a very serious public health risk. The doctrines of religion teach contradictory information in an effort to control the morality of the population. Not everyone is devout, wants to be devout, or knows better than they were taught. Many people are born into a faith and groomed to stay a part of it. This doesn’t mean that they have moral character, something that is born in the brain and can be developed further or stifled by the lessons of life. In fact, maps of the US show that the most pornography looked at in the United States is accessed from the deeply religious south.

Making sex taboo has forced many to engage in sexual activity in hiding. This reduces discourse on the topic, preventing adequate education. Children, without the benefit of a properly educated and mature parent, will never learn all they need to learn about maintaining sexual health, healthy relationships or their own bodies. Teen pregnancy increases with the reduction of education AND health services provided to that segment. Studies have proven that abstinence only education is a danger to society.

All of this said, slut shaming doesn’t even begin to address the issue. Women don’t infect themselves. There is a partner involved, from whom they contract the disease. Without services and education, people have no idea they’re sick. Or, if they do, they know they will be shunned. When this is the way you survive, you don’t make choices based on the welfare of others.

Historically, we’ve seen this born out, so why do we still tip-toe around sex talk in 2015?

Have a look at this article from the Smithsonian about World War II quarantines of prostitutes. The posters promote the “clean woman” morality to the culture. It expresses how the military and other institutions understood that men were making use of prostitutes to satisfy their needs, but places zero blame on these men, while simultaneously asking them to abstain.

The government detained and quarantined so-called “patriotutes” to protect soldiers from sexually transmitted diseases.

I’d love to see the first woman president elected in my lifetime, and I have no doubt that is going to happen sooner or later. I’m in no rush, because I want the right person for the job, who will leave an amazing legacy to our future women. Sure, it is about time. With men like rapper T.I. saying they refuse to vote for a woman for that office still, it makes me wonder what time warp we’ve hit. (Who is listening to that guy anyway?) And, maybe, this is why I feel like I’m the only one bringing up the election sexism we’re ignoring.

Unprecedented attacks on women’s autonomy in the health sector have triggered the old sentiments about cis gender binaries. In 2015, can we finally admit that there are more than two genders? At times, I am granted the hope that things are or have changed, but then something happens—some talking head says something against the LGBTQ community to curry favor with bigoted constituents. Then, we’re warped back to the 1950s and the Red Scare. Did you know that the whole anti-gay stance is predicated upon American Anti-Communism? It is! The nuclear family and all of that is a construct of post war cold aggression between the Russians and Americans. It was built up in this country to help assure we built up our population, by ensuring that every man and woman had babies, and lots of them. In that mix, we were taught what family values were, what/how a woman should be (because she had to be turned back from that job thing she got mixed up in during the war, and how ladies were hogging all the jobs from the men who had finally returned). It’s historical fact, and you can read about it in Lary May’s Big Tomorrow. I read that book cover to cover and several others along with it. This book will open your eyes to a lot going on in modern politics and, especially, the legacy of Reagan. The conclusion: all industries were focused on spreading the consensus, and people became invested in the ideology and haven’t given up on it yet.

The Cold War ended many years ago, but many people who were conditioned by the propaganda of the time are still holding onto those teachings and have passed them onto children who think this is the normal way of being. Surprise folks, but it isn’t and the Jesus, whom a lot of these folks keep reaching to for proof, never mentioned gay anything.

Sexism was doubled down on in the 1950s, as if it hasn’t been for centuries. And it’s being doubled down on again, as women are loosing their rights to healthcare across the nation. The right to her life and bodily autonomy is being questioned in the highest courts, on the basis of hopped up propaganda backed religious ideology, and archaic myths about sexuality and gender. But, in this election, though that is a major issue facing half the population (or more), one of the Democratic nominees appears to only be present because of name recognition, economic status and her cis gender.

No one is talking about it! The sexism in this run up to the presidential election in the United States is going largely ignored. I watched the debates a couple weeks ago and Hillary Clinton continued to mention her gender as a deciding and major factor for why we should be voting for her. Yes, Hillary can understand the issues of white women of wealth. She claims to still understand what it’s like to be working class, which she hasn’t been in over four decades, and then she was a girl who didn’t have to worry about those things.

Does Hillary talk about: Being born into the middle class and despite extensive higher education and marketable skills, that I have somehow become classed as working poor? Or that, my income, which was once considered middle class, can’t cover the rent month to month without going without food, other necessities and savings? That I haven’t been on a real vacation in fifteen years? How about, my cousin, who raised four children on her own, and worked full time but needed food stamps to feed her babies? That her sister, who is a military wife, struggles to get by and achieve the American Dream, despite her family’s sacrifices for this country. Hillary was too busy being a Goldwater Girl and going to college, then catapulting through political offices on someone’s coattails, while working as a lawyer for Walmart and other questionable entities, gaining increasing wealth. She get’s what it’s like to be on food stamps? hahahahahahahahahahahahaha! Is this going to be like Romney eating ramen noodles?

Hillary also talks about how she wants to ensure her grandchild, and by default the rest of the children out there, get’s every opportunity. The disconnect in that statement sailed right over people’s heads. What opportunity is the Clinton grandchild ever going to miss out on? Therefore, how will she ever know what the rest of the children are being denied if that’s her gauge? Those people in the audience should have held their applause, but then, they are sitting at the actual debate, so I assume that majority were celebrities and professionals who had an in—and seriously unlikely to understand real struggle. You cannot relate through a child that has been born into privilege to those who have not. YOU CANNOT. Trying ignores the disparities that exist and prevent achieving economic equality for all people. Point 1. people of color—would you try to relate to a black woman by saying you get it, Mrs. Rodeo Drive? You had best not. It’s patently offensive!

The other thing I noticed about this debate was the fact that, while the Black Lives Matter movement has become a left wing talking point and power grab—that no one mentioned Mrs. Clinton’s background with Barry Goldwater, the senator who voted against Civil Rights. While she was playing at being a Goldwater Girl, Bernie was walking with civil rights leaders to gain People of Color equality. Yet, I’m told she’s fair on this issue and has done a lot. I have yet to see what this a lot is. I’m not even going to mention the turncoat Republicans now running as Dems.

And finally, Hillary spoke pointedly about being a woman in this race to President. Somehow, her rhetoric, despite being so polished it was plastic, centered around: Elect me. I’m a woman and it’s time—and people lapped it up like sweet milk! It most certainly is and has been time that we saw a woman in the seat of President, but is this a point on which to run? I mean is that something to build your campaign on? I’m concerned about your record and the facts about your previous service and political history, GOLD WATER GIRL.

Think about that. Is the Clinton campaign using inequality to curry favor with voters? It appears to me that with the success on the left of the first Black president, her campaign is trying to use another minority group to jump into the seat. I felt utterly pandered to and it made me sick to my stomach. As a screenwriter, I watched softballs lobbed to her and watched lead-ins to talking points tailored to her. Lean in? Oh, honey. That shit was scripted like a reality show and the script revolved around I’m a woman so vote for me.

Why is that being ignored? Why is it okay to say my gender qualifies me for this job, because we’re due? I don’t care if we’re overdue by 1,000 years. It is sexist against both men and women to pander to the minority group in such a way, ignoring the real problems that face women day to day. She lofted out a couple talking points on the abortion debate and planned parenthood and made an off-color remark about being a woman. And, people are applauding that? They remark about how polished she was when that should be making them worried and question why she was so polished.

About a year ago, people were writing about how gender doesn’t matter. Now, it suddenly is a reason to vote for someone. How can we stand by and ignore that? Do we even think about the implications of electing someone who stands a chance at seriously making a worse mess of things for women? You think that the sexist remarks about women are bad now, just wait. Wait until WarHawk Clinton moves us on Iran, or some other bogey man. Wait until the smoke clears on Bengahzi investigations and emails, because there’s a real issue that has yet to be investigated (see the article linked at the end of this post).

You know what else would be a first, since we’re talking about silly reasons on which to base our vote? Our first Jewish president. Imagine how far that would go to quieting the right wing evangelical segment who has been too loud for the past decade, and growing louder, as they chant that faith matters, and call our sitting president a Muslim, using the faith of millions around the world like an epitaph. The religious freedom they keep decrying is backfiring in their faces thanks to pagans and satanists who are exercising the freedom, if only to mock them. Wouldn’t it go a long way to reinforcing the separation of church and state, if they had to deal with a non-Christian in the presidency? But, Bernie Sanders doesn’t act from Judaism in his stances. He does what is necessary for his constituents, regardless of faith, the hallmark of a secular nation. His roots, are still a first, though. And, yet, we’re ignoring the major first he too would represent—and perhaps showing a different kind of bigotry in the process. Antisemitism anyone?Maybe that explains the frothing anger Hillary’s supporters have for Bernie-bots, ironically showing how robotic and monstrous they are.

People really? You don’t vote because it’s a first! You vote for the right individual to do the job. This isn’t the goddamn Oscars! This isn’t class president at high school, which may be the only experience you have with voting, or the only experience on which you base your reasoning. I really hope not!

Although we might elect the first woman president, have we thought about the legacy that individual would leave behind for women? If we put Hillary forward as the candidate, we’d be saying that we don’t mind the top 1% controlling everything, that it’s not important that Wall Street be brought to heel, or that the best candidate mattered to us–we prefer name recognition and a woman. I have yet to hear what she has done so well that warrants her election to that high office. She was my State senator. I was around and very politically aware during her husband’s two terms (which ended in the deregulation of banks and the housing bubble a couple years later, and I remember swallowing my fear and hoping to God that it didn’t turn out as it did, as I watched him, smiling ear to ear, sign that awful law). Her response is that we’re not electing her husband, yet that is the consistent reason I continue to hear from democrats as to why they’re voting for her. I liked Bill, so… The only thing worse is electing someone solely based on their having a vagina. Worse than that? Electing a rich white woman who is funded by Wall Street and big money interests, because it might be a first.

♦Welcome to another edition of the Open Book Blog Hop!♦

#23• Topic: Mother/Daughter Relationships

I am blessed. My situation is probably more unique than it should be. I love my mom. She’s a great woman, who supported me and my only brother first. Family is everything to her, and through her I learned the importance of that idea. Not everyone is as lucky as I am to have such a great relationship with their mother. I know many who revile Mother’s Day. I know others who’s idea of mother is wrapped in the pain of loss. So, I understand completely how blessed I am.

I inherited her looks and the sound of her voice. I’m only slightly taller. I have her talent for cooking and being an animal whisperer—the wild birds have yet to accept me. Above all, I developed my empathy and emotional intelligence because of her. When I think of nurturing, I think of my mother. I pray I’ll be something like her, as close as possible, please, when I raise a child.

We still look forward to doing things together. I call her weekly for updates. She’s more busy now than ever, so making time can be problematic. I’m so proud of her, getting out there, after years of making raising her family and working a priority. Right now memories of sipping hot-cocoa while watching Rankin Bass’s Rudolph spill through my mind—blue twilight of the living room, the hall light on, wrapped in a blanket; the Christmas tree warmly glows, and the gentle tick-tick of a Santa’s workshop animated ornament fills the backdrop.

Just a couple weeks ago, we went apple picking, a tradition that even as an adult, I make sure we keep up. Family is important. I can’t see taking friends to do this. I haven’t settled down yet, that I can take my own family. I see me having a child on my own, and even then, it will be me, mom and dad and the new addition. To me, that’s perfect. As perfect as snuggling up on the couch and watching Christmas specials in the dark.

My memories are so full–sweet little valentines, Easter baskets, and our favorite Halloween traditions of decorating, costumes and trick-or-treats. In fact, our conversation included an excited sharing of my newest decorations found at Target. Oh, they’re so cool.

Mom is the one on the far left, then my great aunt Lillian, grandmother Rose and my great aunt Isabelle.

Back when I was a preteen, we started to have some tension. You see, I was growing up, and mom wasn’t handling that very well. I still can’t tell you what she feared, but she was afraid of something. The tension revealed itself in school shopping for new outfits, disagreements in everyday conversations and lots of silent treatment. We still don’t agree on the facts. The truth is, they don’t matter. I found my autonomy by getting a job as soon as I could and paying for the things I wanted, such as school clothes and music. The delicate balance of conversation was achieved once more. She was, before this, the person I could always talk to and she became that once more. To this day, I can tell mom anything and be candid. Her support doesn’t falter, but she’s also honest when she thinks I might be screwing up.

Mom is my rock. I’m blessed. A member of a small group of women who raise each other up instead of breaking each other down. An even smaller group lucky enough to have a bond. A group yet smaller, who’s traditions haven’t been interrupted by death.

Let’s go over and check out what the other authors have had to say about mother daughter relationships (see below), but, before you go, check out PJ Fiala, who is a romance author originally from Missouri. She moved to Wisconsin with her family when she was 13 years old, city kids learning to farm. The farm started out with 28 rescue cows (they were adopted from the Humane Society who took them from abusive circumstances). With all the hard work and the deep winters, Wisconsin was a hard sell until PJ met her husband. They have four children and three grand children. The pair enjoy riding their motorcycles, on which they meet new places and visit places new and old.

PJ comes from a long line of veterans: “My grandfather, father, brother, two of my sons, and one daughter-in-law are all veterans. Needless to say, I am proud to be an American and proud of the service my amazing family has given.”

‘Do you like to read? Wouldn’t you like to know more about your favorite authors? Well you came to the right place! Join the MMB Open Book Blog Hop each Wednesday and they will tell all. Every week we’ll answer questions and after you’ve enjoyed the blog on this site we’ll direct you to another. So come back often for a thrilling ride! Tell your friends and feel free to ask us questions in the comment box.’To join our Open Book Blog Hop – where we share all sorts of things about “life”.

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The news that tribes can now prosecute non-native domestic abuse offenders is fantastic news. That said, for this to finally arrive in 2015 is clear evidence of the White Patriarchy every one is tired to death of. Whites are tried of hearing about it, claiming we need to stop talking about race and race issues will magically disappear. Natives are tired of having to explain why that isn’t true and the disconnect with their reality that whites have.

It doesn’t surprise me that it has taken hundreds of years for the United States Government to come around on this issue. If you look at the criminal justice system’s track record on Domestic Violence through all sectors, you begin to see how badly that record sucks, to put it bluntly. Would social movements be tagging buzzword slogans like Victim Blaming, Not Your Mascot, Black Lives Matter, War on Women, or Idle No More if there wasn’t an issue encapsulated in those words? Something that these groups are trying to bring to the attention of others, to garner justice?

It’s really easy to dismiss the minority when they speak up against the injustices that they face, for their voice is a small fraction in the tide of all the voices that cry out across the land. Women number half the population, give or take at any time, and are still considered a minority class. Minority status is based on the level of sway a group has in multiple sectors of society, as well as population comparison. Meaning, half the population is underrepresented—everywhere.

Yet, we’re told the pay gap is made up—despite the fact that lower earnings is consistently reported as an issue in most women’s lives, and one of the factors that ties women to a relationship that is dangerous to her well being. Of course, we have those who will cite the men who are abused, as a means of shutting down the conversation, almost immediately. That makes it tough to fight issues. We’re seeing this with both the fight to remove racist mascots from national to local sports teams and again in the Black Lives Matter movement. The groups, however, are getting smarter about addressing that shutdown, by pointing out how saying All Lives Matter dismisses the unprecedented targeting of Blacks by the criminal justice system. Proportionally, the statistics DO suggest that not all lives matter, that Black Lives are not as respected. Think, for instance, the number of rapes that go unreported annually and the known reason of that: no one will believe me, and it’s not worth the horror of a trial to make them. That’s very nearly the same thought minorities have in fighting against the criminal justice system. After all, the laws were not written to protect minorities or women.

Ironically, pulling the rug out from under those discussing the issues around domestic violence imprisons men who are in a domestic violence situation. How so? Relegating domestic violence to the level of “she had it coming” or making jokes like “women deserve equal lefts and rights” likewise does the same. Each time a woman is diminished on the basis of her sex, a gender binary that imprisons all genders, including cis males is more tightly grounded. This traps people in a situation of thinking no one will help for various reasons: you deserve this punishment, no one will believe you, he/she really loves me but, real men would put their woman in her place—and so on.

I’m very glad that the government has made this part of the Violence Against Women act because it will protect not only women, but children and men, transgender people and gender non-conforming people. It is a step in the right direction, providing autonomy, which was promised decades ago to the tribal courts.

In addition, President Obama is about to sign a name change to Mt. McKinley (Alaska) back to the Native Danali. Way to go, Mr. President. This matters so much because it helps to roll back the usurpation by whites of sacred Native areas. I hope to see more things returned to their Native names in the future. I’m proud to be from a Northeastern town that brags a Native name, surrounded by other so named places. This is their land and we don’t have a right to erase them from it, nor does that make this United States more ours by doing so.

Read about the new domestic violence rule here:

WASHINGTON — Two years after Congress reauthorized the Violence Against Women Act, Native American tribes can finally take advantage of one of the law’s most significant updates: a provision that all

The Republican House and Senate are introducing legislation that is meant to punish the LGBTQ community but also allows companies to fire single women that get pregnant out of wedlock. Out of wedlock?? Is this 1950? With them it always seems to be that way. Their archaic platform wants to role us back from 2015 to an imagined Pollyanna version of American history, post World War II.

These Republican legislators will create an impossible situation for all women–one of unhappy if not entirely forced marriages. We are expected to choose marriage and do with requiring a man in our life to oversee us and help pay our way.

I am single and trying to get pregnant before I have no opportunity to have children, because I could not find a partner in time. Yet, they want to call me a bad person because I am not willing to make babies with a man I don’t care about, trick him into marriage and spend the next 50+ years miserable. I have wanted a child since I was twenty. I did the right thing, trying to date and meet the right guy. but…Marriage isn’t about happiness they say, it’s a contractual agreement like a small business in which you manufacture the next generation. I was to be chosen, not partake in mutual choosing, which left me with no recourse but to go alone because the pool of choices is narrow and it narrows further with age.

In addition, to further this baby making company agenda of marriage, they pay women less so they’re forced to either work more than one job, or shack up with someone they don’t want forever with to make ends meet. They threaten us with the loss of our livelihood should we chose to rear children on our own–our choice our bodies, because we’ve not found a suitable partner with which to enter a legal monetary arrangement for the benefit of ‘biblical pairings’ –which forces women into having abortions or, should they chose life, onto the dole to afford the life they’ve brought into the world. These children are the next generation!! They don’t care how you mate so long as you do, it seems, unless you’re single or gay. (starting to see the eugenics in the plan?)

Once upon a time you could afford a nice apartment and have savings all on one job. The system is set up now to make failure and create a pipeline to prison; to shame and control women as baby machines to provide more bodies for war and corporate servitude. Those who buck the system are punished, or eradicated.